Friday, April 20, those attending the 2007 PSWA Conference will have the opportunity to experience Las Vegas as never before. Thanks to Las Vegas author and PSWA member Denny Griffin, all are invited to participate in the Vegas Mob Tour. Attendees who wish to to take the Tour will be able to purchase tickets on a 2 for 1 basis. Details about ordering your tickets will be provided at signup.

The experience begins at 9:30 p.m. in the showroom of the Greek Isles Casino with an introduction and short film about Vegas’s mob-connected past. After that, it’s off to the bus and a trip back in time, to when money was being skimmed from the casinos and sent back to the Midwest crime families by the bagful, those who posed a threat to mob operations were “whacked,” crooked cops provided information to the bad guys, and the man next to you at the craps or blackjack table might be a fellow tourist or a hit man.

Although the main focus of the tour is the reign of Chicago Outfit enforcer Tony Spilotro (Joe Pesci’s character in Casino was based on Spilotro), Allen and his guides provide running commentary that includes how Vegas came to be what it is, such as the background behind Bugsy Siegel’s Flamingo project, and the early influx of Teamster money that financed casinos, hospitals and shopping malls, when banks considered Vegas to be too risky an investment.

In addition to the information imparted about the organized crime days, tour operator Robert Allen, who has been a musician and comic in Las Vegas for over 30 years, has story after story about some of the characters, both famous and infamous, he’s rubbed elbows with over the years.

For more information please visit: http://www.vegasmobtour.com/